VIDEO: Paddling around South Georgia Island

By Andrew Maffett October 26, 2015
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A group of Aussies achieve their 30-year dream of kayaking around South Georgia Island.

AN AUDIENCE OF curious wildlife greeted us and our kayaks in Cooper Sound on the north-eastern tip of South Georgia Island. Fur seals in their thousands surfing offshore reefs like crowded point breaks poked their heads up to peer at us as we passed.

I had wanted to visit South Georgia since I first found out about it three decades ago, in my early 20s. The island is located 1800km east of Cape Horn, at the southern end of South America, and 1500km north-east of the tip of the Antarctic Peninsula.

In 2013, with the prospect of our 50th birthdays before us, my friend John Jacoby and I decided to make it happen. We wanted to celebrate this milestone in 2015 with the ultimate adventure and prove that, as John put it: “Old blokes can still do good stuff.”

Read Andrew’s full story in issue #129 of Australian Geographic.